These are the top 5 best horror movies to watch with your friends this summer.

5# “The Gate” 

When Al (Christa Denton) and Glenn’s (Stephen Dorff) parents (Deborah Grover, Scot Denton) leave town for the

weekend, Al uses the opportunity to throw a party while little brother Glenn and his friend Terry (Louis Tripp) decide to explore a hole left by a tree-removal service in the backyard. When unexplainable phenomena begin occurring, Terry, with the help of his extensive heavy-metal music collection, comes to the conclusion that he and Glenn have accidentally opened a gateway to hell. 

 This movie is not for everyone- it is cheesy, weird and even though this is a horror film, at some points you could definitely mistake it for even being sci-fi, but all in all, this movie is a lot of fun, especially when watching with friends. To any person wanting to get into the horror genre, I would highly recommend adding this to your watchlist. “The Gate” really does help define the turning point in the horror genre when filmmakers started getting creative with their ideas. To the practical props and effects to the vibrant scenes, this movie is truly a feast for the eyes. “The Gate” is still a fun time and a film I definitely recommend.

4# “Gremlins” 

 A gadget salesman (Hoyt Axton) is looking for a christmas gift for his son Billy (Zach Galligan), and he finds one interesting store in Chinatown. He finds a creature in the back of the store that the shop is reluctant to sell him, even when he says he would give the shop owner over $200  for it. Finally, he gives in and gives him the creature, called a mogwai, but leaves him with 3 rules to follow: keep him away from water and bright lights and never feed him after midnight. When all this happens, the result is a gang of gremlins tearing up the town on Christmas Eve.

Joe Dante (the director of Gremlins) delves into the cute and the cuddly and finds the evil green monsters hiding inside in this mix of Christmas comedy, monster and especially horror. This movie is one of my personal favorite horror films of all time. This is one of those movies you have to watch with your friends. It is cheesy, funny and chaotic. This movie is filled with practical effects and is bound to make any movie geek scream. It is a film that knows how to masterfully combine terror with humor, family spirit and countless winks to moviegoers without ever spoiling the mix. From great effects to surprisingly good dialogue, this movie is a blast and if you have not seen it, I would highly recommend adding this to your watchlist 

3# “Halloween” 

On Halloween night, 1963, 6-year-old Michael Myers brutally murders his 17 year-old sister, Judith Myers (Sandy Johnson), and then Michael is caught and sentenced to prison for 15 years. But on October 30, 1978, when being transferred for a court date, a 21-year-old Michael Myers escapes Smith’s Grove and steals a car. He returns to his quiet hometown of Haddonfield, Illinois, where he looks for his next victims. He stalks babysitter Lori Strode (Jamie Lee),  in the movie she is babysitting a kid, Tommy Doyle (Brian Andrews); everything seems to be going well until the unexpected killer starts wreaking havoc and murdering people. 

Even 40 years later, this proves to be a timeless classic. Carpenter shows his early greatness at executing a simple, yet frightening, concept with style. Michael Myers is an icon and it is all because of this original gem. This is, of course, a must watch for any movie goers.  And if you have not seen this film, grab your friends, sit down, turn on your TV and watch it now. Trust me, you’d be doing yourself a favor.

2# “JAWS”

When a young woman is killed by a shark while skinny-dipping near the New England tourist town of Amity Island, police chief Martin Brody (Roy Scheider) wants to close the beaches, but mayor Larry Vaughn (Murray Hamilton) overrules him, fearing that the loss of tourist revenue will cripple the town. Ichthyologist Matt Hooper (Richard Dreyfuss) and grizzled ship captain Quint (Robert Shaw) offer to help Brody capture the killer beast, and the trio engage in an epic battle of man vs. nature.

The true mark of greatness in a motion picture is its rewatchability, and this film is as great now as it was when released in theaters in 1975. John Williams’s score is legendary and instantly recognizable. The music for this film is astounding and perfectly sets the mood of every scene. Spielberg doesn’t serve up mass quantities of blood and gore, but what makes “Jaws” work is the confident direction combined with amazing editing that draws the audience into relaxing at precisely all the wrong moments. Spielberg’s meticulous attention to creating suspense recalls the best of Hitchcock. This is a film that I implore you to watch, especially with a group of friends. The build up and suspense and then finally getting to see the reactions on their faces are bound to create a good time. 

1# “The Thing”

In remote Antarctica, a group of American research scientists are disturbed at their base camp by a helicopter shooting at a sled dog. When they take in the dog, it brutally attacks both human beings and canines in the camp, and they discover that the beast can assume the shape of its victims. A resourceful helicopter pilot (Kurt Russell) and the camp doctor (Richard Dysart) lead the camp crew in a desperate, gory battle against the vicious creature before it picks them all off, one by one.

John Carpenter has always been a man ahead of his time in terms of being a visionary whose DIY approach to filmmaking has led to him having a career filled with misunderstood films, but his 1982 Sci-Fi horror classic “The Thing” might be the biggest example as he crafted a horror masterpiece that was both critically and financially panned due to what people perceived as a gore fest with no story or heart like its competitor in Steven Spielberg’s “E.T.” which relay to its toll on the films success. When watching this film, I have no idea why people felt this way about it from acting to effects and cinematography;l this film is a thrill.